Rust Dependencies Visualizer

Generate ASCII art visualizations of your Rust project’s dependency tree.

Usage

/rust-deps-visualizer [--depth N] [--features]

Options:

• --depth N: Limit tree depth (default: 3)
• --features: Show feature flags

Output Format

Simple Tree (Default)

my-project v0.1.0
├── tokio v1.49.0
│   ├── pin-project-lite v0.2.x
│   └── bytes v1.x
├── serde v1.0.x
│   └── serde_derive v1.0.x
└── anyhow v1.x

Feature-Aware Tree

my-project v0.1.0
├── tokio v1.49.0 [rt, rt-multi-thread, macros, fs, io-util]
│   ├── pin-project-lite v0.2.x
│   └── bytes v1.x
├── serde v1.0.x [derive]
│   └── serde_derive v1.0.x (proc-macro)
└── anyhow v1.x [std]

Implementation

Step 1: Parse Cargo.toml for direct dependencies

cargo metadata --format-version=1 --no-deps 2>/dev/null

Step 2: Get full dependency tree

cargo tree --depth=${DEPTH:-3} ${FEATURES:+--features} 2>/dev/null

Step 3: Format as ASCII art tree

Use these box-drawing characters:

• ├── for middle items
• └── for last items
• │ for continuation lines

Visual Enhancements

Dependency Categories

my-project v0.1.0
│
├─[Runtime]─────────────────────
│ ├── tokio v1.49.0
│ └── async-trait v0.1.x
│
├─[Serialization]───────────────
│ ├── serde v1.0.x
│ └── serde_json v1.x
│
└─[Development]─────────────────
  ├── criterion v0.5.x
  └── proptest v1.x

Size Visualization (Optional)

my-project v0.1.0
├── tokio v1.49.0        ████████████ 2.1 MB
├── serde v1.0.x         ███████ 1.2 MB
├── regex v1.x           █████ 890 KB
└── anyhow v1.x          ██ 120 KB
                         ─────────────────
                         Total: 4.3 MB

Workflow

1. Check for Cargo.toml in current directory
2. Run cargo tree with specified options
3. Parse output and generate ASCII visualization
4. Optionally categorize by purpose (runtime, dev, build)

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